First, there were the days of shock. An unofficial pact to keep quiet. Now, many alumni of the marching band at Ohio State University have said it’s time for their rebuttal.

Hundreds of former band members have been gathering into groups to choreograph an attack against the firing of director Jonathan Waters. Through letters, rallies, public statements and an investigation of their own, they have called on Ohio State to reinstate Waters. They’re challenging the OSU report that led to his firing, a report that some said feels like an attack on all band alumni.

The official alumni club for the band broke its silence on the firing this week when it released a statement urging the university to reinstate Waters. Brian Golden, president of the club, met with OSU President Dr. Michael V. Drake on Wednesday to make his case. The meeting was “respectful,” Golden said in a statement, and the two agreed to continue talks.

But in another statement, leaders of the club announced that they have started their own investigation into the firing and what they called a campaign against Waters and the band.

“No one is legitimately served by his removal,” club leaders wrote. “The honor and traditions of generations of members and staff of the Ohio State University marching band have been misrepresented, insulted and dishonored by the release of the unbalanced investigation report.”

OSU officials declined to comment on specific complaints about the report. “The university stands behind the investigation that was conducted,” OSU spokesman Gary Lewis said.

Some students who are mentioned in the report as examples of the “sexualized” culture have sought to set the record straight that they weren’t victims of harassment.

The report lists 23 nicknames that band members gave one another and that investigators called sexually explicit. Several women have written open letters to Drake saying that their nicknames were on the list, but that they embraced the monikers that they received as “rookies.”

Alexandra Clark said her nickname is “Joobs,” although the report erroneously spells it “Jewoobs” –– “given to a Jewish student with large breasts,” investigators wrote.

“You turned a lighthearted joke and a rookie name given to me by my row mates with my full consent into something shameful, and you decided that my entire identity could be boiled down to being a Jewish woman with a large chest,” wrote Clark, a band member from 2009 through 2011.

Another woman, Jocelyn Smallwood, wrote that OSU investigators interviewed her but never asked about her nickname, “Donk,” which they included in the report. It refers to an “impressive rear end,” she said.

“At the center of this issue is an investigation that I feel was deeply flawed and executed with great carelessness and little concern for finding the truth,” wrote Smallwood, who was in the band from 2009 through 2013. “It seems a shortsighted response to paint an entire organization with a broad brush when you only bothered to interview a handful of people about what has happened.”

Ohio State started investigating in May after the mother of a band member reported that there was a problematic culture that band members took oaths to keep secret.

The report, based on interviews with band staff members and 10 current or former students, said that many traditions amounted to a “sexualized” culture that Waters did too little to stop. One female student in the band was sexually assaulted by a male band-mate last year, investigators found, and there was a case of sexual harassment in the athletic band, which Waters also directed.

Some alumni called those cases “isolated incidents.”

“I’m not here to defend some of the things in the report. I wouldn’t have supported them if they happened in my row when I was a squad leader,” said Jon Picking, 27, who is now a graduate student at Ohio State. “But those are not reflective of the incredibly positive experience.”

Other evidence in the report included an unofficial songbook with gay-bashing lyrics set to fight songs from other schools. One witness told Ohio State that students sang those songs on band trips.

“I can’t emphasize enough how little the songbook was circulated,” Aaron Koch, who was a band member from 2004 to 2009, wrote in an email to The Dispatch. “The only reason I ever saw a copy was because it was shown to me by a band member from the late ’90s.”

Some other former alumni have emailed The Dispatch that the band culture needed to change. In a document submitted to Ohio State during the investigation, even Waters said that the culture wasn’t “in a ‘good place’ currently,” and that he had been taking strides to improve it. He had punished students for alcohol abuse and planned to ban all nicknames, among other efforts he outlined.

As soon as Ohio State received the complaint, though, it was required by federal Title IX laws to investigate. Outside legal experts have said that the university has a responsibility to protect all students in the band, even if most of them are comfortable with certain traditions.

“If it’s one problematic behavior or it’s 30 problematic behaviors, they have to move forward to determine the extent of the behavior,” said Constance

Neary, vice president for risk management at United Educators, a Bethesda, Md., company that provides liability insurance to schools.

It’s clear that, after the investigation, Ohio State wanted to establish a new culture in the band, Neary said, adding that “expectations and responsibility are set by leadership.”

Since Waters was fired, OSU officials have visited band practices to tell students where to turn if they feel uncomfortable. With band tryouts later this month, most students had refused to talk to reporters about the firing. But now, some squad leaders are telling students to speak out if they have opinions, said Hannah Gleckler, who is trying out for her fifth year in the band.

Gleckler defended the band. She also thanked the hundreds of alumni who showed up at an evening rehearsal this week, not to make a public statement, but to support the students.

“The band is feeling really supportive, and we all are closer because this has happened. We don’t feel like we’re falling apart,” said Gleckler, of Marysville. “We’re still trying to be a better band than we were last year.”